The Beginning
by reno-xxxXXXxxx
Summary: Set before any event of FFVII, this story shows my version how the Turks got together.
1. Just Another Day

**Authors note : **This story is based before ANY events of FFVII. It shows my version of how the Turks got together. Enjoy ;) And PLEASE review. Don't read and run!

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Chapter 1 – Just another day

Elena slammed her locker shut, making the door behind her rattle. Another two hours of this to suffer. Why was this happening? Everyone seemed to hate her all of a sudden. Even her closest friends seemed to have grown distance these past few days. Well it didn't matter, two weeks from now she would never have to see any of these idiots again. She turned around to meet a pair of eyes, glaring down on her.

"Yes?" Elena asked keeping her temper. This girl, Claudia, had been pissing her off all day.

"Don't think I don't know what you're doing. Stop screwing my boyfriend or you will regret it. Don't think I'm joking."

Elena sighed. Boys, boys, boys. Was that all these girls ever thought about? Mini-skirts, make-up, sex and drugs were the only topics she heard these sluts talk about.

"You try to scare me, it's not working," Elena said, "I don't even know who your boyfriend is."

"Don't play dumb with me." Claudia grabbed her wrist. "Fucking slut. Get your own boyfriend." Elena laughed. That was rich…

Claudia took something out of her pocket, it only took Elena a second to see what it was; a penknife. She put it close to Elena's wrist. She knew she would do it, she'd seen it happen. Elena closed her eyes, waiting. But it never came.

Opening her eyes, the first thing she saw was Claudia's face, which for some reason, was etched in fear. The hand with the pen-knife was held loosely at her side. Elena's muscles relaxed and she opened her eyes completely. A hand had a tight grip on Claudia's shoulder. Elena looked at him, shocked. He had flaming red hair, blue eyes, impossibly pale skin and a smirk to unnerve even the sturdiest of people.

"You don't wanna be trying that one." He whispered into Claudia's ear. He pulled something out of his own pocket; a real knife, and put it at her throat. It didn't take an idiot to work out that he was only joking, but Claudia was less than an idiot. She screamed and escaped from his grip, running as fast as she could down the stairs. The man pocketed the knife and made his way through the door behind Elena, smiling at her. She didn't know who he was, or what had just happened, but she felt safer than she had through the whole of her school life.


	2. Saviour In Red

**Authors note:** Wow, these chapters are pretty short. I'll try and make the next ones a bit longer. Once again, please review

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Chapter 2 - Saviour in Red

"Elena! Pay attention!"

Elena's teachers voice screamed at her, bringing her out of her daydream. Sighing, she opened her books. Her mind kept wandering back to the red-headed stranger that had saved her earlier. She looked at the time. The bell was about to go anyway. And there it went. Elena shoved all her books in her bag and wasted no time in walking out of the classroom. As she gathered the rest of her things out of her locker, she heard a voice behind her. It was the red-head. She saw him properly for the first time. He was tall; probably about 5 foot 10, and thin. His red hair was spiked at the top and he had a long pony-tail that ran down his back. He was wearing what Elena supposed was a black suit, but it was so untidy you wouldn't have recognised it as one. His shirt was un-tucked and the top three buttons were undone.

"Hey." He said. His voice was strange, very haunting, very sexy, Elena couldn't stop herself from thinking.

"Hi. Um…thanks for earlier." She said awkwardly.

"No problem. Fucking sluts 'round here, I tell ya. You're about the first normal girl I've seen." Elena smiled.

"Thanks. Most people seem to think that's a problem."

He laughed slightly. "Walk you home?" he offered.

"Sure." She followed him out of the building.

* * *

"I tell you, I'll be glad to get out of that dump." He said.

"I've never seen you around here before." Elena smiled.

"New." He replied bluntly.

"For two weeks?" It seemed a little pointless.

"I had a lot of trouble before. I needed to move away." He sounded like he had expecting some one to ask him, like he knew exactly what he was going to say. Elena nodded. She decided not to question him.

"Well, this is my house." Elena said, pointing to the small house just across the side-walk. The red-head looked it up and down.

"Looks nice." He said finally. There was a kind of sadness in his voice.

"Why don't you come in and have something to drink?" Elena offered.

"Nah, best not, I better get back to the … wherever I'm going." He waved her off and carried on walking. There was definitely something strange about him, Elena decided.


	3. Who?

**Author's note:** Well it's a little longer, Chapter 4 will be where the story starts properly, promise ; )

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Chapter 3 – Who?

"Hey, mom." Elena said as she walked past her mother on her way to the kitchen. She dumped her bag on the stairs.

"Hi, honey." Her mother replied. "Good day?"

"Yeah, apart from being threatened with a knife, but yeah it's all good." She said casually.

"WHAT!" her mother shocked her by shouting so loud.

"Chill, mom. Nothing happened..."

"And who threatened you?" she demanded.

"Claudia threatened me, and some new guy got her back, okay?"

"Who's your boyfriend, Elena?" came a small voice from by the window. She laughed at her little brother. She ruffled his hair.

"Silly, I don't have a boyfriend."

"Then who's that?" he pointed out of the window at the red-head who was walking past. He was walking back towards the school, but why? "I saw you walking with him."

"Oh, he's the guy who saved me." Elena said distantly.

"Well he looks nice." Her mother said, also looking out the window, "Look at the color of his hair, ain't it lovely?"

Elena rolled her eyes. Typical mother.

"Why didn't you invite him 'round?"

"I did. He just said he needed to get back." Elena wandered off up the stairs, ignoring her mother and little brother. Who was he? And why had he stuck up for her? Something weird was going on, and she wanted to know what it was.

* * *

As Elena sat out in the Friday evening sun, she couldn't help but feel that someone was watching her. She jumped as she heard a voice behind her.

"I thought I might take you up on that offer after all, if you don't mind." Elena turned around, it was the red-head again.

"Oh…You frightened me, sorry. Sure come sit over here for a while." Elena indicated the seat next to her.

"I realised, I never asked your name." Elena said

"Reno. Just Reno. You?" he said, casually

"I'm Elena. Reno… sounds familiar."

"I doubt we've ever met before." He said

Elena looked at him; the intense sun making was making his hair glow the most beautiful red. She had to admit, he was pretty good looking. Her heart jumped for a second time that evening when his cell phone started ringing. Sighing Reno picked it up.

"What? Yeah… I'm at Elena's. Yes, it fucking is. I already did that you idiot… Yeah, well fucking call him back. Yes there is a need to swear; you really think I'm not capable of doing this, don't you? Yeah… ok, ok. I do not have a short temper. OK sorry. I can't exactly do it right now can I? No I can't, don't be stupid. Listen…fuck, You mean that Claudia girl? Right. Yeah, whatever." He put the phone down.

"Sorry about the colourful language there, 'Lena. I don't swear at every one. Just my boss." She smirked

"You have a job?" She said surprised.

"Yeah, and I gotta go." He said, making for the fence.

"Why don't you get fired for swearing at your boss?" Elena asked.

"Coz I'm just too damned good." He smiled, vaulting over the fence.


	4. Second Opinion

**Authors Note:** So much for trying to make the chapters longer. Oh will, it's alright, right? hint - REVIEWS ANYONE?

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Chapter 4 – Second Opinion

For the first time in a long time, Elena actually enjoyed her weekend. She could go out freely without having to worry about Claudia and her little gang. She knew that if she tried anything, Reno would deal with it.

Taking advantage of this, she decided to go to the mall. She didn't have any money, but window shopping was something she liked doing. She didn't expect the first person to see her to be Claudia, standing right next to the door. Luckily, she didn't see Elena sneak past right under her nose. She kept her head down and carried on until she was definitely out of Claudia's sight. Not looking where she was going, she walked right into someone.

"Sor.." she began to say. She looked up at the flaming red hair.

"Reno!" she cried, startled.

"That was some pretty good sneaking around." He said, casually.

"I…thanks. You saw…?"

"That Claudia chick, yeah." He scowled. "God, she makes me wanna hurl." He cringed.

"You know I think we have quite a lot in common." Elena laughed. "See ya."

As Elena sat out again in the sun, she heard a familiar voice from outside her garden. She saw the tell-tale red hair from over the fence and smiled to herself. She listened to what he was saying on his cell phone.

"Yeah, I'm here now. Ok, yeah, fuck, you've already said that twice, I know. Right, I'll do it now." Elena jumped as a scrunched up piece of paper hit her on the shoulder. "Yeah, done. No I'm not lying. You're obviously and idiot then. Yeah, I will be able to coz I have done it. Yeah I will then. Yeah? Whatever."

Elena's heart sank as she saw him walk straight past. She had been hoping he would come and see her. Then she remembered the piece of paper. Heart racing, she picked it up and un-screwed it :

"'Lena, meet me at the Memorial Park as soon as it gets dark. Don't let me down. It's important. Come alone. Reno x x"

What could it be? Reno was definitely up to something. Should she go? Yes, she had grown to trust Reno enough. She could look after herself, after all. The sun was setting, and it took at least half an hour to walk to the Memorial Park. She unlocked the back gate, leaving no trace that she had gone.

By the time she had got there, it was pitch black. There was no sight of Reno. She sat nervously on the bench, shivering slightly. After about 10 minutes, she heard a voice from the darkness.

"One thing you should always remember if you're gonna get involved. I'm always fashionably late." Reno's figure came into focus.

"Involved?" Elena questioned. He motioned towards a black car that stood outside the park gates. He walked towards it. Elena followed, puzzled. Reno got into the drivers seat and started the engine.

"Come on then." He said, pointing to the passengers seat. She got in.

"How can you drive? You can't be any more than 16." Elena asked.

"'Course I'm older than that. I didn't really come to your school as a student. I came for you." He was smirking slightly. Elena suddenly became very scared. Was she doing the right thing? And now, nobody knew where she was if anything bad was to happen. After all, she hardly knew Reno. She was pushed back into her seat when Reno drove off abruptly.

"You wanna slow down?" she said, willing herself not to be sick. His driving was dreadful.

"Nah, not really, 'Lena. Making great time here." He looked at her. "Don't look so worried. Trust me, I ain't a rapist, I would say I'm not a murderer, but I guess I am of sorts…"

"If that's supposed to make me feel better, it hasn't worked very well." Elena said, although deep down it had made her feel slightly less uneasy.


	5. The Turks

**Authors note:** YAY!! I managed to make it a tiny bit longer again. I know it's probably going a bit slow, but bear with me, k? please, please, please review!!

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Chapter 5 – The Turks

Reno put the brakes on rather sharply, making Elena's seatbelt choke her slightly. They had stopped outside a large building with "Shinra Electric Company" written above the door. Elena had a bad feeling about this.

"Come on." Reno said, getting out of the car. Elena followed, rubbing her bruising neck. She expected him to take her in through the main door, but he walked round to a small door round the back. They stepped into a brightly lit room, with two people sitting on a small table in the middle.

"Reno, it's about time." The shorter of the two men said. He was dressed in the same clothes as Reno, except he was a little more presentable. His black hair was tied in a short ponytail.

"Yeah, screw you; I just drove about 90 down the highway to get here on time." Reno ranted

"And still you're 40 minutes late." The man said smiling.

"I am not. I'm 20 minutes early!!" Reno said in a shocked voice.

"There's such a thing as daylight savings, Reno." The man laughed. Reno walked off, muttering something about "the fucking government, screwing up the time so I have to get up earlier…" Elena couldn't help but laugh at him.

"Elena, we have been expecting you. My name is Tseng, This is Rude." He said, indicating the muscular man still sitting at the table. Rude nodded his head towards her. "We are part of a group called the Turks. Oh, and sorry we had to put you in the hands of that homicidal maniac." He added, Elena laughed.

"So, was that whole thing a fake?" She asked.

"The school thing? Yeah. We decided Reno would be best to do that because as you can probably see, he is the youngest."

"But why?"

"We want to recruit you. We've known about you for a long time. There's not many people who are Turks material, which is why there's only 3 of us at the moment. I think you have what it takes."

Elena stayed silent. She never thought she was any different to anybody else. She wasn't strong; she never stuck up for herself. She always considered herself to be a very weak person.

"How can I have what it takes? I'm just…" Elena said sadly

"I know what you're thinking." Tseng said. "It takes more than physical strength to be a Turk. It takes patience, it takes brains, it takes understanding. More than one of those Reno lacks, so I guess he wasn't a very good example to send to you." Elena laughed.

"But what about school, and my mom?" she asked.

"Everything has been taken care of. They have been contacted. So, what do you say?"

"Well, what have I got to lose?"

"From what Reno's been telling us, not a lot." Tseng smiled.

A mumbled shout of "Piece of shit!" was heard from the other room. They all laughed as Reno re-entered the room. His watch was in his hand, in several pieces.

"This thing got insurance?" he asked.

"Fortunately, yes."

They all stared at Reno. Tseng broke the long silence.

"Reno? What's up with your shirt?" He asked.

Reno pulled his jacket round himself.

"Nothing." he lied.

"Reno, don't lie." He said. He walked over to him and pulled his jacket away from him. There was blood on his shirt.

"I'm a Turk Tseng, people want me dead." He said

Tseng ripped open his shirt to reveal a large, and rather infected looking, gash across Reno's stomach. He looked queasy for a second, then fell backwards slightly, holding onto Elena for support.

"Why do you always keep stuff like this from everyone?" Tseng said. "That's poisoned, where did it come from?"

"Some random guy attacked me, okay? I dunno who he was or anything." He said, in a slightly strained voice. Tseng came over to help lay Reno down on the sofa. A thought suddenly came through Elena's mind.

"Umm…Reno? What did this guy look like?" She asked

"Short…black hair, about 16." He said, heavily. Elena's heart sank. She knew who that was. She had lied to Claudia by saying she didn't know her boyfriend, and it sounded like Claudia had taken advantage of this false information. It had been him that attacked Reno, she was sure of it.

"Why?" Tseng said.

"No reason. I was wondering if it was anyone I knew, but no…"


	6. First Mission

**Authors note: **Another chapter up. Thanks to the couple of people who reviewed. More would be appreciated. And yes I know it seems like i like seeing Reno be hurt, but trust me i don't. It just fits the story together better. 3

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Chapter 6 – First Mission

"I'm fine. Fucking hell. It's just a scratch!" Reno said angrily.

"No, sorry Reno. You can't go." Tseng said. Reno jumped to his feet, ignoring the twinge of pain.

"See, look!" he said, pointedly. "Absolutely perfect."

"Ok then. You can come. But there's no going back. If you start feeling you can't cope half way through, too bad."

"Fine, whatever." He said, buttoning his shirt.

Elena heard all this as she made her way into the room.

"Going where?" she asked

"Your first mission…" Reno said, in an irritated voice.

"What is it?"

"You do know the kind of things we do, right?" Tseng asked her.

"Of course."

"Right, this is yours and Reno's mission. You are to find a certain girl, named Claudia Dixon, I presume you know her?"

Elena nodded, "Then what?"

"Either kidnap her, or kill her. Depends on how she co-operates with Reno."

"Kill?" she was shocked

"She has obtained valuable information from Shinra, and had stolen large amounts of materia, thanks to Reno's carelessness."

Elena nodded. She would not show weakness, not in front of the Turks.

"Alright, Reno? Elena? Get going."

* * *

Reno's pace was getting slower and slower the closer they got to their destination. Elena watched him out of the corner of her eye. He was breathing heavily and he looked very sickly. The poison was clearly taking effect.

"Reno, you okay?" she asked, concerned.

"Yeah, never better." Elena wasn't sure if this was sarcastic or not. "Right, we're here. Now the hard part. We gotta find her." He pulled a gun out of his pocket and started towards the dark alleyways.

"Is the gun really necessary?" Elena asked.

"That chick's dangerous, you should know. You'll get one of your own soon enough." He grinned.

"Quiet, there she is." Elena caught sight of Claudia, sitting on a trash can, smoking a cigarette. Typical, Elena thought. She walked up to her, Reno staying around the corner as back-up.

"Haven't seen you in a couple of days." Elena said, she wasn't even slightly scared of Claudia now.

"Oh, well look who it is." Claudia said coolly. "Don't try and scare me now. I know what you've gotten into."

"I'm not trying to scare you." Elena said bluntly, "I'm just asking you to co-operate with me."

Claudia laughed. "You? Why would I?"

"Because…you know what she's gotten into." Reno's voice came. He made himself clearly visible, gun as well.

She laughed again. "Your red-headed friend too? I'm sorry, but 2 can play at that game." Elena's jaw dropped as Claudia pulled a gun out of her pocket. Reno smirked.

"Little girls shouldn't play with toys like that." He said. Claudia seemed irritated.

"You," she shouted, "Have grated on my nerves since the first time I saw you. I think it's time someone taught you a lesson."

Reno laughed at her. With him being so tall, it must have been amusing to see someone at least 6 inches shorter than him trying to be intimidating. Elena couldn't help but think that Reno was being too confident.

Claudia screamed in annoying and held the gun up towards Reno.

"Don't think I won't…" she said unsteadily

"You're fucking nuts. This bitch needs putting down." He sounded slightly unnerved. He fired his gun just a second after Claudia fired hers. Elena screamed as she saw Reno fall to the ground, blood pouring from his stomach. Unfortunately, Reno's bullet only grazed Claudia's arm, and she fled, like the coward she was.


	7. Blood On Our Hands

**Authors note: **Woot!! Things are finally gonna get heating up. Pretty please review? I've not been doing this very long and comments would be greatly appreciated. I'm not sure how long this story is gonna be because I keep thinking of thngs to add as I go along. Oh, and the title of this chapter, I was quite pleased with it. I can't usually come up with good titles. It is of course refering Claudia. Well, enjoy

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Chapter 7 – Blood on Our Hands Still Pumps through Our Hearts 

"Reno!" Elena screamed, running up to him. She lifted his head up of the ground.

"Reno? Please say something. Don't die, please." Elena found herself crying over him.

"'Lena?" he panted. He struggled to his feet, clutching onto Elena for support. He seemed quite stable, despite the amount of blood he was loosing.

"C'mon. I'll take you home. You'll have to show me where to go though."

"'Lena, the mission needs finishing." He said, seriously

"Reno, you got to be kidding me. Come on." She gently dragged him. Reno, not having the energy to argue, followed.

* * *

Elena's back was crippling her by the time she got back to Reno's apartment, because of basically having to carry him all the way. But she remembered she had to stay strong. It was getting harder and harder to tell herself this when it came to cleaning Reno up. The amount of blood on his shirt she didn't think anybody even had it their body. She poured boiling water into a bowl and put copious amounts of salt in it. She remembered her mother doing this when she was little to stopped grazed knees getting infected. Grabbing the bowl and some cloths, she headed back into the living room. 

Reno was sitting on his sofa, looking strangely bright-eyed. Elena knew he had no shirt on because she had removed it earlier, but she couldn't help but stare slightly at him.

She sat down next to him with the cloths and bowl in her hand.

"Now, this is gonna hurt a little." She said putting the cloth on the wound. She felt his muscles tense.

"Fuck!" he said loudly. "What the hell is that?"

"It's salt water. It stops it from getting infected." She said, matter-of-factly. "You don't want what happened last time to happen again do you?" she felt a twinge of guilt as she remembered who had attacked Reno the first time. She couldn't keep it to herself any longer.

"Reno, I know who attacked you before." She said quickly

"What? Who?"

"It was Claudia's boyfriend. I don't know why, I just know it was him." Reno looked shocked for a minute, and then he narrowed his eyes.

"These idiots really got something against me, don't they?" Elena nodded and carried on cleaning Reno's wounds. He bit his lip hard to try and ease the stinging. She hated seeing him in pain, but it had to be done.

"There, done." She said kindly, wiping up the last of the liquid.

"Thank you." He sighed, relaxing his muscles. He had bit too hard on his lip, it was now bleeding.

"Oh, Reno." She sighed, laughing slightly.

"So more to the point, what's gonna happen? They are gonna keep trying till they kill me, aren't they?"

"I don't know. I don't understand why they are doing this. I mean, it's not even me anymore is it? It's just you."

"She did look pretty familiar you know, the first time I saw her, but I don't think I met her before. You usually remember people as stupid as that."

Elena stayed silent, listening to his every word as she finished putting the bandage around Reno's wound to try and stop the blood flow.

"I'd better ring Tseng, hadn't I?" she said when she had finished.

"Yeah I guess." He handed her his cellphone. "You left yours at home." He added, seeing the confused look on her face.

"How do you know that?"

"I'm a Turk, I'm trained to notice every little detail." He smirked.

Elena saw Reno watching her as she dialled Tseng's number. She couldn't quite place the look that he had in his eyes, but it was making her quite uncomfortable. She tried to ignore him as she heard Tseng pick up his phone.

"Hello?"

"Tseng? It's Elena."

"Oh hey, how did the mission go?"

"Not too well."

"Oh, why?" he said, his voice full of concern

"Claudia got away. After nearly killing Reno."

"Uhhh…killing? Not again…"

"She shot him. I've managed to clean him up best I can, I'm at his apartment with him now."

"Okay. Can you manage to stay there tonight? I'm gonna find it difficult to get away and I think it's a good idea if someone is there to watch him."

Elena's heart leapt, she didn't really know why. "Sure, I can do that."

She hoped she didn't sound too eager. She looked over at Reno as she put his cell phone down on the table.

"So…you gonna stay here to … keep an eye on me?" Elena could no longer ignore the strange grin on his face.


	8. Everything Burns

**Authors note: **Update!! Thanks to everyone for nice comments, especially ToolittleToolate. Well keep reviewing!! I took a long time over this chapter. I wanted to describe everything perfectly. I hope the extra effort has payed off

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Chapter 8 – Everything Burns

"Reno…?" Elena suddenly recognised the look on his face. It was lust.

"Elena… I think I realised why Claudia always hated you." This wasn't what she expected.

"W-why?"

"She was jealous. It's obvious isn't it?"

"Jealous?"

"You…are the most beautiful girl I've ever layed eyes on. I think we should take Claudia down…together. Even if we have to go with her."

Elena looked at him. There was something not quite right. He had a slightly…crazed look in is eyes. It was scaring her slightly. She searched around in her bag. Finding the right material, she cast "Sleepel" on him. It was the first thing that came to her head. Something was definitely wrong.

As he sat unconscious on the couch, she dialled Tseng's number again on Reno's cellphone.

"Reno, if that's you, get lost. It's late." Came her reply

"Actually, it's not Reno, it's Elena."

"Oh, sorry. What's up?"

"I think there is something wrong with Reno."

"We all know that already."

"No..no. He's acting so weird. I had to put him to sleep, he was scaring me."

"Hmm…sounds strange. Did anything else happen while you were with Claudia?"

Elena looked at Reno, sleeping peacefully. "I don't know."

She was cut off by a piercing scream. It was the kind that made even the toughest of men want to curl up and cry with sorrow.

"What the fuck was that?" Came Tseng's urgent voice.

"That…was Reno."

"What the hell is wrong with him?"

"I really don't know." She was panicking now.

"Listen, can you manage until tomorrow morning?"

"I guess I'll have to."

* * *

Shaking slightly, Elena walked up to Reno's still form. He hadn't made a sound other than that scream. Looking at him, she saw a solitary tear running down his face. She sat down next to him, a hand on his warm forehead. What had happened in Reno's dream that had made him cry out like that. She nearly screamed herself when she heard a voice from below her.

"That fun, is it?" he said, cockily. She had been absent-mindedly playing with a stray bit of his fiery hair.

"Sorry." She said quickly.

"Heh, don't be." He put a hand on her shoulder and pulled her down to his level.

"Reno, do you remember anything that happened before you went to sleep?" she asked awkwardly.

"I remember seeing you." The lustful look was still in his eyes, but the crazed one had vanished. Whether it would be back or not, she could not say. But she couldn't stop herself from liking the way he was looking at her. He put his hand on her face. his long, slender fingers inter-twined with her blond hair.

"Reno…" she began. She was cut off by Reno pulling her into a kiss. Long and passionate. It would be a long time before she would admit that was her first kiss. With people like Claudia around, boys didn't have much time for her. That was what she liked about Reno. Although he seemed to type to be turned on by short skirts and makeup, he wasn't.

After what seemed like an eternity, Reno pulled away sharply. Elena looked up at him.

"Reno?" he had a new look in his eyes: desperation. He gasped slightly before his face slackened and his eyes closed. She laid him back down on the couch. He seemed okay, she wasn't sure if he was in any pain or not. When was Tseng coming? It was 7:30 am. Where had the night gone? Suddenly, there was a sharp knock at the door. Pulling it open, she saw Tseng, his eyes filled with concern.

"Where is he?" he said quickly.

"Through here," she led the way into Reno's living room. "He's unconscious now."

Tseng rushed towards Reno. "Where was he shot?"

She opened his shirt and pointed to where blood was staring to soak through the bandages. Tseng took them off to reveal the open wound. He stood back up straight and searched for something in his pocket. At last he pulled out a pair of tweezers.

"Ummm…" Elena began. He put his hand up to stop her. Elena turned away, eyes tightly shut. She hated blood, and she definitely didn't want to see Tseng searching around inside someone's body with a pair of tweezers.

"Look." Came his sharp voice. Elena turned around. Held between the tweezers was a small, bloody item. It looked distinctly like a computer chip.

"What the hell is that?" She said loudly.

"I think you were a bit squeamish to remove the bullet, weren't you? This was inside it."

"But what is it?"

"Not a clue. We'll have to get someone onto that." He put the chip in a small plastic bag and put it, along with the tweezers back in his pocket.


	9. Control

**Authors note :** Two updates in one day! woot! . Well this chapters full of quite a lot of emotion, lovely lovely. A bit of suspense too, I guess. Once again, I spent a while trying to describe everything properly. Please enjoy!!

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Chapter 9 – Control

"Reno?" he heard the voice, but he couldn't quite gather the energy to reply.

"Is he awake?" a different voice, male. He finally managed to open his eyes.

"Reno!" Elena gasped, relieved. "How are you feeling now?"

He tried to speak, but the words wouldn't come, he was exhausted, and the pain in his stomach was coming back to him. Elena put a hand on his forehead.

"Elena, I'm gonna have to get back to the office. Are you going to manage okay?" Tseng said. Reno noticed him for the first time.

"Are you gonna check out tha…?" Elena began.

"Yes. I'll get on it right away." Tseng cut her off, looking at Reno.

"Elena?" Reno finally mustered up the energy to talk, albeit quietly. "You know what happened, before I passed out…?

"I need to know if you meant it or not." She said quickly.

"…Yeah, I know. And I did. I also meant what I said before that."

"You weren't in the right mind then, how can you have meant any of it?" she found her eyes stinging with tears. "Reno. Tell me the truth?"

"I am in the right mind now, aren't I?" he smiled lightly, "And I know I meant it."

"But…why? Out of all the girls you can pick? I just can't believe some one like you would pick me."

"Someone…like me?" he smirked

"Well…You're the charmer aren't you? Everybody falls for you. I mean look at me!" she found herself angry and she didn't know why. "Don't mess with my heart Reno. I'm not the kind of person who can handle it." She wiped the tears from her eyes and turned away from him.

"Elena?" she felt a hand on her shoulder. She turned around. Reno had sat himself up and was smiling kindly at her. "Believe me. You would know if I didn't really like you. The people I don't like, they're the ones who usually get a bullet through the head." Elena couldn't help but laugh.

"But…love?"

"If I didn't, would I do this…again?"

He pulled her into another kiss, just as passionate as last time. But it was different. She was slipping. The protective barrier she had placed around her heart all her life was melting away with this kiss.

"Well?" he smiled. Elena stared at him. She had never seen this side of him before. She liked it, but she couldn't shake the feeling that this wasn't real.

* * *

"Tseng?" Tseng looked over at Rude, the usually silent, stoic Turk was standing next to him, concern etched on his face. "What happened to Reno?"

Tseng put the little computer chip he was working on down on the table.

"He…That mission, to get Claudia. She shot him. This was imbedded in the bullet." He pointed at the chip. "I've got no idea what it is, but it seemed to have a great impact on the way Reno was acting."

Rude nodded. "Have you tried asking Hojo?"

Tseng kicked himself for not having though of it earlier. "Of course…" he strode out of the room in search of Hojo.

His luck seemed to be stretching out today, as he bumped into him on the way out of the room.

"Hojo! Get in here." He said, rather rudely.

"What?" he said coldly as Tseng dragged him into the room.

"What…is this?" he said holding up the chip.

"Hmm, yes. I recognise this. It was in a bullet, no?"

"Right. What is it?"

"It is…something I developed a long time ago."

"You made it?"

"Yes. It has blood on it. Who was shot with it?"

"Reno."

"Ahh, yes. That loud-mouthed red-head. Did it control him?"

"Yeah, from what Elena was saying, it did." Tseng was slightly confused

"Then, the other part must have been used. It won't work otherwise."

"Other… part?"

"Yes. In the form of a small needle. It goes…just here." He put a finger to the side of his neck.

"Oh great." Tseng sighed. "So what does it even do anyway?"

"It greatly amplifies the emotions of the victim. Some say it turns them crazy. There have been reports of people's lust and desire to kill going completely out of the window. They were confiscated and destroyed; it must be 10 years ago now. I don't know where this came from."

"Lust and desire to kill? Oh shit, Elena." Tseng grabbed his jacket and hurried back to Reno's apartment.


	10. Reality?

**Authors note: **Three updates in a day!! Well, it's MayDay bank holiday, and i've been bored all day, so what better way to pass the time? There's a little more romantic stuff in this chapter please review?

* * *

Chapter 10 – Reality…?

"Elena! ELENA!" Elena heard someone yelling. She pushed Reno off her and buttoned her shirt.

"Tseng? What the hell?" she straightened her hair out and ran for the door.

"What is it?" she panted

"Reno. Where's Reno?" he said urgently.

"He's just through there, what's the problem?" Tseng pushed past her into Reno's living room. Elena followed, confused. Reno's slender form was stretched out across the couch, Elena was sure he was pretending to be unconscious. At least, she hoped.

Tseng roughly turned him over and brushed his flaming hair out of the way.

"Wha..?" Elena started.

"Just wait. Good job I got here in time … There." He seemed to pinch Reno's neck sharply and pulled away. Luckily, he didn't see Reno flinch. Elena looked at what Tseng held in his fingers, a small needle-type object.

"What's that?" she said, curious

"It's part of that chip thing. It was Hojo's creation, so he knew exactly what it was."

"So what was it?"

* * *

"Lust and desire to kill? So none of it was real…" Elena's heart sank. Tseng had explained to her exactly what Hojo had said.

"None of…what was real?" Tseng wasn't supposed to hear her. "Elena, what happened?"

"Nothing. Honestly, if it was anything I would tell you, right?" she smiled.

"Right." He didn't sound overly convinced. "Well, I'll leave you now then. I need to get back. Will you be able to come to work tomorrow?"

"I dunno, it depends how Reno is." She looked at him.

"Right." Tseng turned to leave, "Oh, and you can stop pretending to be unconscious now Reno."

* * *

"'Lena?" he saw the tears running down her face.

"None of it was real Reno. Don't you get it? It was all controlled by that … thing."

"'Lena, it's gone now. I still feel the same. If it wasn't real, I wouldn't feel this way, would I?" He edged closer to her, the lustful look was still in his eyes.

"Are y-you serious?"

"Aww, c'mon 'Lena, don't cry. I'm telling the truth. Why are you so convinced that I don't like you?" He put his arm around her shoulder as she broke down in tears.

"I-it's not that. I-t's just, I'm so worried, about everything. Reno?" she looked up at him, her brown eyes shining with tears. "If anything were to happen to you, I don't know what I would do. You've helped me so much, and now people are out to kill you. A-and I know Claudia, she w-won't stop until she gets what she wants."

"Don't worry." He pulled her closer, "We will sort it out. We're Turks, right? And Turks do NOT get murdered by someone like her."

"Reno?" This time it was her that started it, she kissed him, enjoying it so much she kissed him harder. Reno kissed her back, unbuttoning her shirt at the same time. Elena followed suit and ripped his shirt open, running her hand down his chest, she jumped backwards when she felt the wound beneath her finger.

"Don't worry." He whispered, pulling her back towards him. She laid down on her back, their lips still locked together as though they never wanted it to end. She ran her hand through his unruly red hair as he started kissing further down. First her neck, then onto her chest. She could really feel his weight on her, but it didn't bother her. It made her feel…protected in some way. He moved back up to kiss her on the lips again, but as he did so, Elena's senses returned to her.

"Reno…we shouldn't be doing this." She gasped

"What?" he was breathing heavily, "You want me to stop? I was hoping we'd go all the way….but if you don't feel the same way…" he backed off.

"No no, Reno, please?" she pulled him back, "It's just you're hurt, and …" she sighed, "I just can't shake the feeling that you don't mean this."

"Aww 'Lena. It's gonna take time, after everything that's happened, you'll just have to learn to trust me."

"I do trust you Reno. And I feel the same way. I…I think I love you."

"So what better way to show your love?" he grinned.

"You just wanna get some don't you?" she laughed, "Not had any in a while?"

"No actually. I been saving myself for someone special." He smirked at her.

"Oh yeah?" she said quietly, "Who might that be?"

"Trust me Elena." He said, leaning back towards her.


	11. Revenge

**Authors note :** Another update . I've tried to speed thing up a bit other wise i'll still be writing this in years to come! This is mainly form Reno's point of view, the lines indicate moving in and out of his flashback. Enjoy!

* * *

Chapter 11 – Revenge

Elena slowly opened her eyes, shielding her face from the bright morning sun. Memories of what happened last night came flooding back to her as she looked over at Reno. He was apparently sound asleep, a smile lightly etched onto his face. She could see the slight mark that the needle had left in his neck, and a thought suddenly rushed into her head.

"Reno?" she said, shaking him, "Reno? For god sake wake up!"

Reno groaned and turned himself over. Loosing patience, Elena prodded him, hard, in the ribs.

"Oww…'Lena! There wasn't any need for that."

"You are such a heavy sleeper. Now listen. I just thought of something. You know that needle thing?" he nodded, "Well, how did it get in your neck? Claudia certainly didn't put it there before she shot you."

He thought about it for a minute, confused.

"Wait a minute. It was that guy. Yeah. I'm sure. He grabbed hold of my neck and I'm sure I felt something sharp."

"Claudia's b-boyfriend?"

"Yeah. Then when I wouldn't do what he asked, he did that." He pointed to the gash on his stomach.

"And…w-what did he want?"

"He wanted to see Rufus Shinra. I told him I didn't have the authority to let him do that, he didn't like it and … well."

"R-Reno? Are you quite sure you've never met Claudia before? She seems to want you dead, yet you don't even know her."

"I'm certain. I've only ever known one other person named Claudia. And that was, like 2 years ago."

"And who was she?"

"Some random girl, about 14, brown hair, brown eyes. Pretty serious stuff that happened back then…I'm not proud of it."

"Erm… Reno? Are you sure that wasn't the same Claudia? She does have brown hair and eyes too you know."

"I…I don't know."

"Well, what happened then?"

He sighed. "Well…"

* * *

It was a cold, February morning. Typical that it was a day like this Reno had to be outside. He stood in the rotting bus stop and lit up a cigarette. It was gonna be a long day. He looked over at the house in front of him. It was small and run-down, his target was in there. A middle-aged woman. A prostitute. Why did Tseng always make him deal with people like that? Apparently, she had stolen a remarkable amount of stuff from Shinra headquarters. Weapons, materia, that sort of thing. He had been ordered to either kidnap her, or kill her if she didn't co-operate.

* * *

"That sounds awfully familiar." Elena said.

Reno nodded.

* * *

He dropped the cigarette end on the floor and made his way towards the house. He brushed his wet hair off his face as he saw someone come out of the house. It was a young girl, about 14. This was Claudia. She sat on the front porch and looked up at Reno.

"Hello." She said, kindly. Her eyes were big and brown, he would never forget the sweet innocence he saw when he looked into them…

* * *

"Oh my god." Reno suddenly said.

"What is it?"

"It was her. That girl. It was her."

* * *

"What you doin' sitting out here all alone?" he asked her, sitting next to her.

"My mom told me to go sit out here coz I was bad. I stole her cigarettes. I wasn't gonna smoke them. But she didn't believe me." Reno was surprised how she was telling all of this to a strange man she had only just met. He never realised it was a cry for help.

"Is your mom in there?" he asked kindly.

"Yup. Just go in, the doors always open anyway."

He stepped into the house. It was just as small and run down as it looked on the outside. As he walked into the kitchen, he saw a woman sitting at a small table, smoking a cigarette.

"There's no need to ask you are." She said, cockily, "I'd recognise that hair anywhere."

Reno stayed silent.

"So, Shinra sent ya, did they? They always get you to do the dirty work?"

"That's what I'm paid for." He wasn;t in the mood to be played around with this morning. "Now, you know why I'm here. The question is, are you gonna come with me?"

"Ha, you Shinra thugs are all the same. Co-operate or get beaten. All brawn, no brains." She looked him up and down. "Although you appear to have neither."

He glared at her, she was really getting on his nerves now.

"I've been ordered to kill you if you do this. You want it to end this way?" he pulled the gun out his pocket.

"Go ahead. I've got nothing to lose." She said bluntly. "Though you don't look like the kind of person who has the guts anyway.

That was it. He held the gun up at her, his hand shaking slightly through annoyance. The loud bang could be heard a mile off, and all the birds fled from the trees in fear. The girl came running back into the kitchen, tears in her eyes.

"Mom? MOM!" she screamed running over to her.

"Sorry kid." Reno said casually. He walked past her and left the house, leaving the girl to cry over her own mothers dead body.

* * *

Elena stared at him.

"You killed her mother?"

He nodded.

"Oh Reno…"


	12. ReBriefing

**Authors note:** Okay, chapter 12. This ones a little shorter than the last few chapters. It's all starting to come together now I think. Oh and the "attention span of a maggot on dope" thing, it's something my dad said to me other day which I thought was quite appropriate Enjoy!

* * *

Chapter 12 – Re-Briefing 

Elena's bewildered stare seemed to make Reno angry.

"Oh Elena, did I not just say I wasn't proud of what I did? But right now, I am. I'm a Turk and I enjoy it. You act so weak Elena. You're never gonna get anywhere acting like that."

Elena was shocked. Then she remembered. This was Reno. The person she had spent the last 24 hours with wasn't. Well, it was good while it lasted…

"Sorry, Reno."

"Sorry?" He looked at her.

"Maybe I shouldn't be in the Turks."

"What?"

"I guess I'm just not cut out for it." She looked at him sadly.

"Hey, I can't go back to being the rookie again!" he said, shocked

"Well Tseng said I needed to be strong, in every way, and …"

"You talk too much. You really listened to what Tseng told you? Just be yourself, don't take it too seriously."

"Reno? We have people's lives in our hands as we speak." He looked at her, puzzled. "Do you actually remember anything we talked about?"

"When?"

"Yesterday, about Claudia." He was lost

"Oh right. Yeah."

"Well you were a bit more enthusiastic about it last night. Do you remember…anything that happened last night?"

"Erm. I don't know."

"Claudia needs to be killed remember?"

"Oh right yeah. I vaguely remember Tseng saying something about that."

"You have the attention span of a maggot on dope, you know that?" she couldn't help but laugh at his bemused expression. At that moment, Reno's cell phone staring ringing.

"Yeah? Oh. Fine. Yes thank-you." He seemed to be trying to be polite to his boss, "What? Now? Elena too. Fucking hell. No, no fucking problem at all. I'll short temper you in a minute…"

"Well?" Elena said, smiling.

"We gotta report to Tseng. Now." He sighed, "Well, come on." He indicated the door.

"Aren't going to change first?"

"No." he looked at her as thought the answer to this question was obvious.

She sighed and followed him out of the door.

* * *

"Good morning, Reno." Tseng greeted him as he walked first through the door. Ignoring him, he walked straight into the room and collapsed onto the couch. Tseng shrugged. 

"Morning Elena."

"Hey."

"What's up with him?" he pointed behind him at where Reno was.

"Not a clue. I think he needs a re-briefing."

"What, the lat mission?"

"Yeah, he can't remember anything. He's back to his old self again. Unfortunately." she added quietly.

"Sorry?" Tseng looked at her.

"Nothing." She smiled.

"Reno? If you're still alive, sit up and listen." Tseng said sharply. Reno moaned loudly and sat up.

"Okay, first. This mission. You failed to either kill or kidnap Claudia. An attempted murder of a Turks counts as another offence in my eyes. I want her dead. This time we'll do it properly." He handed Reno a file. "And this time, read it."

"Right, you want us to do this now right?" he sighed.

"Yes. But before you go…" He put something in Reno's hand. He looked down to see the watch that his short temper had caused him to destroy a few days earlier. It was fixed.

"You'll be needing it." Tseng smiled.


	13. The Reunion

**Authors note: **Chapter 13!!! Yay! Well, I decided to take a break from the main plot, just for this chapter. Hope you guys don't mind me keeping ya in suspense! Well, I'm back at school now (fun) so I'll be doing only one update a day probably. Enjoy

* * *

Chapter 13 – The Reunion

"You really need driving lessons." Said Elena queasily, as she stumbled out of the car. After Reno's insane driving, she wasn't sure she would be able to walk properly again.

"Ahh, don't be such a baby. It's not that bad." He said, obviously amused. "Now, where do we gotta go?"

"Reno, have you read the file Tseng gave you?" Elena sighed.

"Yep." He smirked

"I don't believe you."

"Ask a stupid question, get a stupid answer."

"So that's a no then?"

"Of course."

Elena handed him the file. He looked up at her.

"Can't you just save me a lot of pain and tell me?"

Elena sighed. "Apparently, at the end of the street where my school road is, there's a club. Tseng said she would be there."

"I would really like to know where that man gets his information. What time we supposed to be there for?"

"12:30."

"How do you remember every little detail?" Reno looked at his newly fixed watch, which was fixed loosely around his scrawny wrist. "That gives us…2 hours. Why'd he send us so early?"

"No idea."

"So what are we gonna do for 2 hours?" he absent-mindedly brushed a stray strand of red hair from his face.

"Well…my mom's house isn't far from here. You think we could go and see her?"

"Can't see that would be a problem… I suppose."

"You don't sound very happy about it."

"I just… never mind."

"Don't worry. Come on." She laughed.

* * *

"Mom?" Elena shouted as she opened the front door to her house. "Anyone here?" 

They walked into the kitchen, Elena's mother was sat at the table, attempting to feed her little brother his breakfast. Upon seeing Elena she jumped up and pulled her into a rib-cracking hug.

"Elena! Oh dear, you have no idea how worried I've been about you."

"Mom…" she squirmed. Finally she was released. Slightly out of breath she introduced Reno.

"Well, this is Reno." She said, pointing behind her.

"Hey." Reno said

"It's your boyfriend!!" said Elena's brother. To everyone's surprise, she turned beet red. She was, of course, the only person who knew what had happened between her and Reno. Even Reno himself had forgotten.

"He is not, he's a Turk. We're friends, right?" she looked at Reno.

"Yeah." He smiled.

"Well, anyway, Elena? Reno? Can I get you some breakfast?" Elena's mother said kindly.

* * *

After a long, long argument between Elena and her brother about Reno's hair, her mother stood up from the table. 

"Elena? Can I have a word?" she said, pointing to the next room.

"Sure." She said. They left Reno eating his fourth round of toast and teaching the little boy sitting next to him about dinosaurs.

"What's up?" Elena asked.

"Sweetie, please come home. I know… you're probably enjoying yourself. But it's a dangerous thing to get mixed up in. Reno seems nice, but he's not going to be there to protect you every time." Her brown eyes were filled with sadness.

"Mom. I'm sorry. I'm not gonna give this up now. I'm too involved. I already owe Reno so much."

"In what sense?" she asked, curious.

"He saved my life, remember? He even took a bullet only a couple of days ago."

"He took a bullet?!" she was shocked, "Poor boy. Where? I thought he looked a bit pale."

"No, it doesn't matter. I have to be careful how much I say. I'm sorry but I can't give this up."

"Reno? Ready to go?" Elena said, re-entering the room. Reno got up to leave, only to find the little boy clinging on to his arm.

"Don't go." He plead sadly.

"Why does this always happen?" he sighed, rolling his eyes, "Listen kid, we'll come back soon, okay? Don't worry about it."

"Promise?" he said, loosening his grip.

"Sure, whatever." He let go and Reno made for the door. "Anything to keep the little brat off my back." He said to himself.

"Take care, Elena." Her mother was in tears.

"Don't worry, mom. I'll be fine." She hugged her one last time.

"I think you're forgetting something." Elena said. She pushed the file Tseng had given him earlier into his chest, smiling. "What are you like…?"


	14. Last Chance

**Authors note:** Another chapter, I nearly didn't have time to do this one tonight. Well thanks to everyone who's helped me get over 1000 hits on this story. I tried to get Rude in a bit on this chapter. Nearlt finished now, although, I'm struggling to come up with a good way to end it.

* * *

Chapter 14 – Last Chance

"Ten minutes." Reno said, looking at his watch. He was nervous, and he didn't know why. Probably just the suspense of it all, Elena thought. She was nervous too, but she knew exactly why. She couldn't stop thinking that Reno as going to be hurt again. Tseng had given her a gun like Reno's, so even if he was over-confident again, she was ready to take action.

"I hate this." He said. "This is why I am always late for everything."

"Don't be so impatient. You need to make sure you're ready. Something…unexpected might happen."

"Yeah, whatever." He looked around the corner, and checked his watch again. "Hurry up."

Suddenly, they heard someone laughing. Elena peered around the corner. Claudia had just walked out of the back of the building.

"Shhh, it's her!" she whispered to Reno. He pulled his gun out of his pocket and they stepped silently around the corner. Unfortunately, she saw them straight away due to Reno tripping over a loose brick and using a colourful variety of swearwords, some of which Elena had never heard before.

"You again?" Claudia sneered, "You are so hard to kill off. You mustn't be as stupid as I thought, if you worked out what I did to you."

"I definitely ain't as stupid as you looked." Reno repled sharply. He fired a her, hitting her in the neck. Elena stared at him.

"You were supposed to give her one last chance to co-operate with you Reno!" she said

"Tranquilizer." He said bluntly. He walked over to Claudia and rolled her roughly onto her back.

"Come on then. You heard the woman. You gonna stop being a stuck-up bitch nad come with us?"

"Y-you…" she said quietly, "I won't let you get what you want. Not again. I remember you… my mother…"

"Yeah yeah. Well, looks like you're both gonna meet the same fate then doesn't it?" he pulled out a second gun and fired. Grabbing her handbag, he revealed a lot of material and several files, similar to the one Tseng had handed to them.

"All ours." He said, chucking the bag to Elena. He knelt down and put his fingers to her neck.

"Gone."

* * *

"Where the hell is Tseng?" Reno said loudly as they walked into the Turks lounge. Rude was sitting hunched over some paperwork on his own.

"Went to see Rufus, I think." He said. He watched Reno as he plonked himself down on a chair beside him.

"Whatcha doing?" he said

"Paperwork, that you made for us." He smiled slightly at the pretend shocked look on his face.

"Me? Never."

"So, how did it go this time?" Rude sounded slightly concerned.

"She's dead. She was being stubborn so…" Elena dumped the bag of material and files in front of Rude.

"And this is what she stole from the headquarters." She said. Rude peered quickly into the bag and pulled out one of the files.

"Have you seen this?" he said to Reno. He looked at it. Printed across the middle was, "Turks, Reno."

"This is my file?" he said, shocked.

"That must be how she managed to get her boyfriend to find you." Elena said.

"That … urgh. How crap is the security here? I mean, my file? My records, everything about me, and she can just walk in and take it. Just great…"

"This is a lot of material she managed to take as well." Rude said, looking in the bag.

"Reno? You've been arrested by Rufus Shinra himself? How does that work?" Elena said. Reno looked up at her. She was reading through his file.

"Do you mind?" he said, snatching it back off her, "That's very personal."

"Sure. I don't think I even wanna know what else is in there."


	15. Family Ties

**Authors note:** This is a very, very short chapter, I know. It's just to try and start tying everything together. Not sure how many more chapter there's gonna be, but it will just be enough for me to end it without leaving any loose threads. Enjoy!

* * *

Chapter 15 – Family Ties

The slums had always been the same. Dirty, dusty and run down. There was only one building that contrasted against that dark atmosphere. A small, but friendly bar. A solitary man sat at a well-worn table, watching the curvaceous barmaid clean glasses. The man's blond hair moved slightly as the door opened, letting in the cold wind. Both figures looked up to see a young woman, shivering slightly step into the light. She had short, dark hair and brown eyes, and a very solemn expression on her face.

"Long time, no see, Yuffie." Said the barmaid, smiling.

"Hey." Her expression didn't soften, even at the sight of her two old friends.

"What's wrong?" said the barmaid, brushing her long dark hair back off her face.

"Bad news." Yuffie turned to the blond-haired man sitting at the table. "You remember your sister?"

"Haven't seen her in 10 years." He replied bluntly.

"She's been killed."

"Killed?" he looked up at her, his eyes showed no emotion

"There was a witness though."

"Who did it?" he said sharply

"Two Turks. Elena and…Reno."

"Reno?" he said loudly.

"Yeah. Don't do anything stupid. I know it's not a nice thing to say but, you don't know her, do you? 10 years is a long, long time, right? She might have deserved it."

"Even so…he…" he couldn't find the words to say.

"Well, I just thought I'd let you know, seeing as though it looked like nobody else was going to. I'll get goin' now, 'kay?"

The man nodded and she turned to leave.

"Please, please don't do anything stupid Cloud."


	16. The Traitor

**Authors note: **This is getting a bit beyond just the beginning, isn't it. Lol. Well I hope you're all starting to see where this is gonna tie together. Remember that this is just my story, entirely fictional, and most of this stuff in this story didn't happen at all. I am of course talking baout Claudia's boyfriend and the fact that he was in soldier long before Elena was in the Turks.

* * *

Chapter 16 – The Traitor

"There you are, sir!" Elena said as Tseng walked through the door. He looked at her and Reno in surprise.

"I wasn't expecting you to be back so soon. Is she dead?"

"Yup." Reno said cheerfully. "And I managed to get out in one piece! What a day this is, eh?"

"And this is everything that she stole." Elena pointed to the nag on the table. Everyone looked at Rude who was looking at something small in his hand. He held it up. It was another computer chip, exactly the same as Reno's had been.

"Where the hell did that come from?" Tseng said, shocked. Rude held up another item, a small plastic box, just big enough to fit two of the chips in.

"So," said Elena, rubbing her chin, "She must have stolen them from here too, right? That's how she managed to shoot Reno with one."

"All that material, a un-safe experiment, and…Reno's file?" Tseng said, seeing the file in Reno's hand. "Someone in this building is a traitor, and I'm gonna find out who it is."

"Huh?" Reno said, looking up from the file.

"There's no way she could have got all these without help. Nobody could, the security is too tight."

"Hmm. You know, half the stuff in here I didn't even know about." Reno said

"Trust me; Rufus Shinra probably knows more about all of us than we do." Tseng said smiling.

* * *

Lunch was usually an entertaining time of day thanks to Reno, but today he was nowhere to be seen.

"Where is that idiot?" Elena said, as she sat down.

"He said he wasn't hungry." Rude said. Elena stopped in her tracks, mouth open.

"I don't believe you." Rude shrugged. "We sure this is the same person we're talking about?"

At that moment, the red-head in question dropped himself down on the chair beside Elena, she jumped.

"Reno! You idiot, you scared me!" she shouted.

"Fuckin' lost him again." He muttered, completely ignoring her.

"Where you been, man?" Rude asked

"Just…no where" he looked over to the door opposite them. "Shit. There he is again." He got up, taking a couple of slices of Elena's toast, and made his way towards the door. A man with black hair seemed to notice him and moved quickly away. Reno broke into a run.

"What the hell's he up to now?" Tseng said.

"I recognised him. Who is he…?" Elena said staring after him.

"Newest recruit. A Soldier…his name's Zack. Why?" said Tseng.

"Zack? Oh no." she got sharply to her feet. "Reno?!" she shouted, running after him. Rude just shrugged at Tseng's inquisitive stare.

* * *

"Reno? Where are you?" Elena shouted. She spotted him by the window in the lounge, gun in hand. Elena recognised it as his tranquilizer.

"Reno?"

"Shut it 'Lena." He fired. "Gotcha, you bastard."

"Reno? You know who he is?"

"Why do you think I just did that Elena?" he put the gun back in his pocket and headed out the door to where the man had fallen. Elena followed.

"You! You bastard. You know how much trouble you've caused me?"

"I-I… what are you talking about."

"Shut up." Reno kicked him.

"Are you Zack?" Elena said, slightly calmer.

"Y-yes. What's the problem here?"

"Don't play dumb with me. You and your slut of a girlfriend have done your best to kill me!" he shouted.

"Reno! Calm down." Elena hissed. He thumped her lightly on the shoulder.

"Get up." He said sharply. He grabbed Zack's arm and pulled him to his feet.

"You will regret this." He said. Reno laughed

"The only person who actually works with you is dead. How will I?" Zack smirked slightly, which annoyed Reno. He kicked him in the back of the legs.

"Move."

Reno led them back to the cafeteria, straight to Tseng and Rude. Tseng looked up at Reno.

"Reno. What the hell is going on with you?" he said, seeing Zack's face. He was slightly drowsy from the traquilizer.

"This…" Reno pushed Zack forwards, "Is the fucker that tried to kill me the first time."

"_You_ are Claudia's boyfriend?" Tseng said. "Reno, take him somewhere safe. We'll deal with him later." Reno nodded and pulled Zack back. Elena made to follow them, but Tseng stopped her.

"He'll be fine Elena. Stay here." Elena sat back down and watched Reno push Zack out of the room.

"Sir? Is it …Zack who stole Reno's file, and everything?" Elena asked nervously.

"He had access to the files, yes. But I have no idea how he got hold of the chip. They were supposed to be destroyed. I guess some must have got missed."

"So you think it was him?" asked Rude

"It seems likely, he applied for the job around the time Elena joined us I think."


	17. News

**Authors note: **Yet another chapter. I know Zack is completely OOC, but I don't really care!! He's not a main character so... well. Yeah Enjoy

* * *

Chapter 17 – News

Reno came back about 15 minutes later in a foul mood, sporting a black eye and split lip.

"Oh god, Reno. What have you done this time?"

"It's that son of a bitch. He really doesn't wanna be here." He sat back down next to Elena, wiping the blood off his chin. "Don't worry, he's much worse off after doing this."

"We're gonna need to get some information off him." Tseng said.  
"Like what?" Elena asked eagerly

"We need to know a little more about Claudia, and Zack for that matter, so this doesn't happen again."

"Ouch, Reno. That looks bad." Elena tried to get a closer look at Reno's eye.

"It's fine, 'Lena. Leave it. You gotta let me …get information from him. I tell ya, he won't refuse.." Reno said angrily.

"We'll all go. It's safer that way."

* * *

"Right. You gonna tell us what we wanna know or you gonna get what your girlfriend did." Reno said forcefully.

"Reno…" Tseng stepped in front of him. "Let's start again. We need some information from you, if you fail to co-operate, well…" he raised his eyebrows and looked at Reno.

"What do you want to know, that would help, wouldn't it?" he said cockily.

"Don't talk to us like that." Reno snarled, "You're not in the position to. You, when you attacked me, Claudia put you up to that, right?"

"Yeah." Zack shrugged.

"Do you have any other associates?" Tseng asked calmly.

"Avalanche mainly. You see, Claudia's brother is in Avalanche. We haven't had any contact with him, just other members."

"Avalanche. Great." Reno sighed.

"Who is her brother?" Tseng said sharply.

"Strife…Cloud Strife."

"What the fuck?" Reno shouted.

"Yeah we're great friends me and Cloud. Haven't seen him in a while."

"Hang on…Why is her name Dickson? Shouldn't it be Strife?" Elena asked.

"She was adopted. That's why Cloud hasn't seen her in ages. Seemed their parents couldn't cope with her."

"So all that fuss over me killing her mother, when she wasn't even really related to her?" Reno said irritably

"Oh so you're the one who killed her? They always said it was a Turk."

"Don't get to comfortable here." Reno said, getting annoyed at his casual tone, "You're still in very deep here…"

"Reno, do you need to leave?" Tseng said loudly.

"No. Sorry." He said quietly.

"Right. So, does Cloud know about Claudia being dead?"

"Not a clue. I haven't spoken to him."

"Well." Tseng chucked him a company cell phone, "You're just about to."

Everyone in the room watched as Zack dialled the number on the cell phone. Reno's jaw twitched in annoyance. He put the phone to his ear.

"Cloud? It's Zack. Yeah…have you heard? You have? Oh. Yeah I did. Ok. Well don't do anything stupid Cloud." He looked nervously to the Turks surrounding him. "Well, I better go, I'll ring you again sometime and we can talk properly. Bye."

He lowered the phone slowly.

"Well?" Tseng said, eyebrows raised.

"He heard. And he's…not happy." He said grimly.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Reno said

"Well…I would make sure you're on an all-out defensive for a while."


	18. Blackout

**Authors note:** Woot! another update! It seems ( and it was pointed out to me by one kind person ) that I forgot to mention that this whole story is basically my complete re-write of the Final Fantasy VII story-line. I'm pretending that none of the events that really happened in the game/film didn't happen, this is of course referring to the whole Zack thing

* * *

Chapter 18 – Black-out

"Great. This is just great, remind me why I should have to do this?" Reno said moodily. He had just been given a huge wad of paperwork.

"Because I'm not letting Rude take all the work-load because of things you've done. It's paperwork about you, so you can fill it in."

He made his way towards the table, hitting Elena lightly on the head as he passed her.

"Reno! I wish you wouldn't do that. You really scared me." She said, frightened.

"Penny for them?" he sat next to her.

"I was just thinking…" she turned to Tseng, "What Zack said obviously means that Cloud is gonna try something, right?" Tsend nodded, "But doesn't that mean it's mainly Reno that's in trouble here? After all, he killed Claudia _and _her adoptive mother."

"Well, we're all in danger. But I guess… Reno would be in the most danger, yes."

"Oh, great. This day gets better." Reno said looking up from his papers.

"Don't worry, I'm sure you won't let anything happen to Reno like you did before, will you?" Rude looked at Tseng expectantly.

"…Of course not." Tseng turned to leave the room. "And I expect that finished by the time I get back Reno."

"C'mon, Rude man, gimme a hand with these." Reno pushed a few papers over to him. Rude sighed but did as he was told. Suddenly there was a loud bang, and Elena came running into the room.

"You guys here that?" She said urgently

"Nah, think I'm going deaf in my old age." Reno said sarcastically.

"Ha ha, very funny." She sat down next to Reno.

Then, they were plunged into darkness. Elena shrieked and grabbed Reno's arm.

"Elena, c'mon." he whined.

"We'd better get out of here; somebody's blown the main power supply." Tseng's voice came from the doorway.

"Give you three guesses…" Reno began. He looked over at Elena, smiling slightly. The only light source in the room was the small window behind him. It made his hair and his eyes glow brightly, it was starting to make her feel uncomfortable. Suddenly, some one far off in the building screamed.

"W-what was that?" Elena said nervously. Reno was looking across her, straining to see beyond. They saw Tseng's outline leaving the room.

"Where the hell do you think you're going?" Reno shouted at him. He ignored him.

"Reno? Rude? What's happening?" Elena was starting to get quite scared now.

"I don't know. I really don't, but something tells me it's Strife." He replied. Elena was shocked that there was no trace of fear in his voice or his face. She supposed he had been trained to handle situations like this. Reno moved forwards towards the door, only to be pulled back by Rude. He opened his mouth, but Rude cut him off.

"We need to stay here. All of us. The last thing we need is you going wondering off, you're in more danger than all of us."

Reno stopped trying to get away. "Yeah, I suppose." He looked up. They could all here movement above them.

"The air vents are above us?" Reno said, questioningly. Elena was petrified now.

"There's some-one in the air vents?!" she said urgently.

They heard the sound of something creaking open and someone dropping onto the floor only a few feet away from them. The light from the window was so dull; they couldn't see who it was.

"Who's there?" Reno said confidently. The person came forwards into the light. None of them knew who he was, but they were sure of one thing: he was there to kill them.

Before the man could do anything, someone opened the door and fired two shots, one after the other. The first hit the wall, dangerously close to Reno's head, and the second hit the un-known man, square in the chest.

"Nice shot, sir." Elena said, still slightly shook up.

"Come on, we've gotta get out of here. We've been invaded, there's fights going on everywhere." Tseng said, panting slightly. They all made for the door except Reno, who was still obviously shook up at his near-death experience, looking at the hole in the wall. Elena grabbed his hand and pulled him after her out of the door.


	19. Race For Life

**Authors note: **Another chapter!! this story is getting pretty long ain't it? Well anyway, I left it on kinda a cliffhanger. Hope you all enjoy!

* * *

Chapter 19 – Race for Life 

Elena still had hold of Reno's hand as they ran after Tseng and Rude. Elena ignored Reno trying to catch her attention and concentrated on getting out of there. Suddenly she stopped, making Reno run straight into her.

"Where are they?" she said quietly. They were in a dark corridor and all she could see was the room ahead which was quite brightly lit for some reason.

"Finally, that's what I've been trying to tell you…" Reno panted. "C'mon." he walked forwards, motioning her to follow. As they walked towards the room ahead, it became clear that there were a lot of fights and the faint glow was coming from the numerous spells being cast. Reno nearly yelled out loud when he tripped over something on the floor.

"Oh my…Reno?" Elena looked at the floor. There was a body there, quite clearly someone from Shinra. He appeared to be not quite dead. Elena bent down to help him, only to be pulled back to her feet by Reno.

"C'mon, 'Lena. We gotta work on saving ourselves first." He grabbed her hand her away.

They entered the room, immediately seeing Tseng and Rude fighting for their lives against a lot of people dressed similarly to the man they had seen earlier.

"C'mon." Reno pulled on Elena's hand lightly and they crept, unnoticed around the edge of the room.

Reno pulled out his gun and aimed towards the group where Tseng and Rude were struggling. Elena opened her mouth.

"You should know by now, I don't miss." Reno said. Elena was about to point out that he had indeed missed the first time they had been assigned to assassin Claudia but Reno had already fired, hitting one of the people Tseng was being attacked by. Tseng looked slightly confused for a minute, then looked over to Reno and Elena. Unfortunately, so did the other man Tseng was fighting.

"Oh, shit..." Reno said, staring to run, Elena following in his tracks. Before Reno knew what had happened he was hit by a spell the man was casting. He fell to his knees, Elena ducked down to help him. Judging by the sudden wave of exhaustion that had come over him, he gathered it was "sleepel".

"Reno? Come on. We have to get out of here." She tried to pull him to his feet. Her voice seemed to become distant in his head, and he wasn't sure where he was. He tried to pull himself together, for Elena's sake. She was the rookie, after all. He dragged himself to his feet and grabbed Elena's hand.

"Let's go." He said weakly. She followed him, alarmed at how much he was stumbling, and amazed at how he was managing to resist the spell. He suddenly stopped and turned to Elena. They were surrounded. The only way was back, and then they would be stuck anyway. Reno took his gun out again and shot at them. His aim was bad due to the sleep spell. Suddenly, they heard shouting form behind them. Elena turned to see Tseng and Rude running towards them.

"Come on." Tseng said holding his hand out to Elena.

"Reno...?" she turned to him.

"Just go." He shouted, falling to one knee, still shooting. Elena nodded and followed Rude and Tseng to safety.

Reno's mind was becoming more and more clouded. He still fired at the enemies before him, but he wasn't having much luck. He lowered the gun, unable to fight the spell any longer, and collapsed on the ground.


	20. Truth

**Authors note: **20th chapter!! This is going much further than I originally planned, but there you go! Well, this chapter is the first on that's entirely from Reno's POV. another cliffhanger though!! Enjoy

* * *

Chapter 20 – Truth

The first thing Reno became aware of was the immense pain in both his head and his left arm. Groaning, he struggled to sit up. He looked around him; he was in nearly pitch black, and completely alone. The situation was enough to unnerve him slightly. He looked down at his arm to see the damage. He had been hit, although not badly. What puzzled him the most was why his head hurt. He had been put to sleep like that before, but he had never woken up with such a headache. He put a hand to his forehead only to find when he looked at it, it was covered in blood. He sat puzzled for a minute, unable to shake the feeling that something was really, really wrong.

He looked at the bodies that littered the ground around him; luck would have it that the one nearest him had been holding a flashlight when he dropped. Reno picked it up and turned it on. All around him was still and silent. He tried to get up, still holding the flashlight, but he had no strength left in him and he collapsed back down to the floor. What the hell was wrong with him? He tried again, managing to get to get onto one knee without it collapsing under his weight. Shining the torch around again, he realised what was wrong.

There were bodies on the ground, but from that height, Reno could see that there wasn't actually that many; not as many as there should have been. It seemed like… every sign of life had vanished from the building. Where had everybody gone? From the increasing pain in his head, he gathered someone had had a pretty good go at killing him, but he thought they would have made sure there job was done. He had just sat back down, wondering what to do, when he heard a noise behind him. He looked round sharply; a figure was standing in the doorway. Reno's heart seemed to skip a beat as the figure started walking towards him. As he came in to the dim light of Reno's flashlight, he recognised who it was. It was the man that Tseng had shot, the one who was in the air vents. He now, however, had no trace of being injured at all. Reno gasped as the figure pulled the hat off it's head. He had known him all along.

"Strife?" he said weakly. That was it. He was done for. He was injured, alone, and in a room with Cloud Strife. He was not expecting what happened next.

"Reno… you're alive?" he said sitting down next to him.

"Don't sound too disappointed." Said Reno, puzzled. He shone the flashlight straight at Cloud, making sure he was for real. Then he noticed it, a small mark on his neck; as though a needle been pushed into it.

"Oh my fucking…Strife?" Reno said, not believing it.

"I know, everything that happened. The needle."

Reno stared at him a moment longer, unable to believe it.

"Why aren't you trying to kill me?" he said. He thought he might as well ask the blatant question instead of skirting around it.

"Because, I never wanted you dead in the first place. Claudia did." He said, slightly solemnly

"She…did that?" he pointed at his neck.

"Yeah. And…what the hell happened to you?" Reno saw he was looking at his forehead.

"No idea." Then he remembered. "Zack! Where's Zack?"

"I don't know."

"Strife, you're not mad? I killed your sister."

"Yeah, I know. You have to get yourself out of here, Reno." Cloud stood up. "I'll never forget what happened in the past, and I'll never forgive you. Any of you. But I won't hold it against you. Just stay out of my way and I'll stay out of yours." He left Reno sitting there, still shocked about what had just happened.

As Reno sat on silence, thinking about his options, a sound filled his ears. It started quiet, but it was definitely getting louder. Fire, there was no mistaking the sound of burning. Then it sunk in. He had to get out; but the most important question was, how? He couldn't even stand up.

Gathering together the little energy he had left, he managed to get himself to his knees, and began to crawl, albeit extremely slowly, towards the fire exit on the other side of the room. The smell of the burning was now starting to fill his lungs, making him feel drowsy. It was getting more and more difficult for him to keep conscious enough to carry himself any further, with the smoke getting thicker and thicker. Finally he made it to the door and pushed it open. He looked out of it. The idea was to use the ladder to climb down the side of the building and to safety. Well that definitely wasn't going to happen, he thought to himself. Although he was on a second story floor, he was out of options, and pulled himself out of the door and fell down into, what he hoped, was safety.


	21. Safety

**Authors note :** Okay, this chapter is a little weird. It sort of varies between Elena's and Reno's POV. I think it turned out ok though, let me know what you think. Thanks so much to all my kind reviewers for their comment and such on this story. It is only my second one after all, so I need all the help I can get!

* * *

Chapter 21 – Safety

"Tseng." Elena panted, trying to keep up with him and Rude. "Wait!"

Tseng slowed and grabbed Elena's arm, pulling her forwards.

"We have to hurry." He said, just as exhausted.  
"But…what about Reno?"

"He can look after himself." Rude piped up. They stopped at one of the fire exits. Tseng pushed the door open.

"Go." He said to Elena. She nodded and lowered herself down onto the ladder below her, Tseng and Rude followed.

Elena stumbled slightly as she dropped onto the hard ground. She looked up at the building before her, and saw the smoke.

"Tseng! There's a fire." She shouted. Tseng merely nodded and looked up grimly.

* * *

3 hours later, the fire had been put out, and the remaining members of Shinra were searching for any signs of life in the ruins. Elena kept looking out for Reno, his unmistakable red hair made him easy to spot, but the more she watched the people search, the less hope she had.

"That's it!" she said loudly, jumping to her feet. "I'm looking for him myself." She ran of in the direction of the building.

* * *

He was alive. Alive, but in incredible pain. Who knows what damage that fall had done to him. He opened his eyes, although even they hurt. He was laid on his back, and looking up he could see the door he had escaped from earlier. He coughed, the soot and smoke from the fire was still in his lungs. But, he had done it. He had survived. He shown Cloud and whoever the other people were; no one could kill a Turk.

* * *

"Where are you Reno?" Elena said quietly to herself. She came back out of the door to the building. He was no where to be seen, dead or alive.

"Elena?" she heard Tseng's voice calling to her. She shook her head.

"Have you tried outside? Reno's not easy to kill off, he must have found some way to get himself out."

"The fire exits?"

"Maybe." They both walked around to the back of the building.

"You know the building better than me." She said to him, "What fire exit would be nearest to where Reno was?"

Tseng thought about it for a minute, clearly working it out in his head. Then he walked forwards.

"This way." He said. They walked right around to the back of the building. "There you go." He pointed ahead of them. Elena ran forwards.

"Reno?" she approached the slender figure on the ground. "Reno!" she knelt down beside him and lifted his head. He was conscious, barely. She looked at him, his forehead was badly cut, as was his neck. Looking further down him, it became obvious that both his left arm and leg were broken.

"Elena?" he muttered

"Reno? How the hell did you do that?" she looked up at the fore door, two storeys above them. "Did you just throw yourself out of that door?"

He nodded.

"Tseng?" she shouted back to where the man was standing. "A little help?"

He hurried forwards and grabbed Reno's broken arm and put it around his neck. Elena did the same with his good arm and together they lifted him to his feet. Reno was too exhausted to acknowledge the pain of his arm and leg.

"Let's get back to your place." He said. "Come on Rude." He shouted to the man who was helping find other survivors. He abandoned his work and followed them to a black car that was parked outside. Carefully, Tseng and Elena put Reno in the back seat and got in the front themselves. Rude sat in the back next to Reno. He stared at the younger Turk, amazed at how he had managed to keep himself alive. Reno looked back at him and smiled weakly.

"What did I always tell ya, Rude? No-one can kill a Turk."


	22. Recovery

**Authors note: **Update!!! Well, I'm not too sure about this chapter. I think Cloud is waaaaaaaay OOC, but hey, who cares? Anyhoo, Please let me know what you think, and any suggestions/requests are welcome!

* * *

Chapter 22 – Recovery

Reno opened his eyes; he was in room decorated completely white, which hurt his eyes slightly. There was a dull ache through his whole body. He looked ahead of him where three people were standing, realising one of them was holding his hand.

"Welcome back," Elena said, smiling. The whole room had come into better focus, then he realised where he was.

"What are you scowling at?" Tseng said

"Fucking hospital…you know I hate them." He replied weakly. Elena laughed. "Can I go now?"

"Reno… you probably can't even get out of that bed, and I don't think the hospital would let you leave this room. There's a children's ward next to here, you might scare them." Tseng said, slightly smiling.

"What? Why?"

"You've looked better." Elena put her hand back into his. It was pale and cold, like that of a person close to death. Elena shuddered at the thought. But he really had looked better, his skin was pure white, and his eyes looked strangely dark.

"Well, its 11pm, we better get going." Tseng said.

"Yeah." Elena said quietly, "You gonna be ok?"

"Of course." Reno said cockily

She smiled and followed Tseng and Rude out of the room.

* * *

He didn't know what had woken him up, but he knew he hadn't been asleep long. He lifted his head, and his heart jumped when he saw two figures standing in the doorway. One of them licked the light switch.

"Reno?" the two people who met his eyes were the last he expected.

"What the fuck?" he shouted.

"Shhh! Be quiet!" the first figure hissed. Tifa's red-brown eyes didn't show any anger, which surprised Reno.

"What the hell are you doing here?" he whispered

"We wanted to tell you to get well soon!" Yuffie smiled widely at him.

"No seriously, when do I get murdered? You could at least wait till I can fight back, or is that the point?" he asked

"Nobody's here to kill you." Came a voice from outside the door.

"There you are, Cloud!" Yuffie said loudly. Reno raised his eyebrows at Tifa.

"I'm only here to get one thing straight. You don't mention a word of this to anyone outside this room, ok?" Cloud said seriously.

"Yeah, or that's when you get murdered." Yuffie piped up

"Shut it." Reno said angrily. Yuffie stuck her tongue out at him.

"Anyway, I think it's fair that you know exactly what happened, as you were so involved."

"Happened with what?" Reno asked.

"Claudia." Reno nodded. "A couple of weeks ago, I was shot, I didn't know who did it, but now I know it was Claudia."

"You were shot by your own sister?" Reno said with disbelief

"Yeah. See, she didn't care about me, she only wanted to get back at you. So she used me, and hoped I would do it for you. You can only imagine how she felt when you showed up at her school."

"So, she used that little chip thing on you, too?" Reno was beginning to understand.

"We only just figured out what had happened." Tifa said, "We found out about the bullet, but the needle…"

"So you don't actually care that she's dead?"

"To be honest, I think the world is better off without her. I know she's my sister, but she never acted like one."

"Cloud, we'd better get going."

"Yeah." Cloud nodded and together they left the hospital room.


	23. Back

**Authors note:** Right, i think there's gonna be one more chapter after this, then it's finally finished!! I might be worng and my imagination right run off on one agian, but nevermind. This one's a little bit of humour in it, to break up the otherwise quite serious storyline a bit. Enjoy!

* * *

Chapter 23 – Back

"What the hell is up with the security here anyway?" Reno said. The next day he felt a lot better, even though it didn't show in his face.

"What do you mean?" Tseng said.

"Well, whenever it's anything involving me, the security is so lax around here. What's up with that?"

"Well, they all probably had help from the same person Claudia did." He said, smiling.

"Zack?"

"Exactly. But how did he get out, I wonder?"

Reno thought about this for a minute, then it clicked.

"That guy, it wasn't Cloud. It was him. Zack." Tseng looked at him, puzzled. "You know, the one you shot. He came in through the air vents.

"Of course."

"…This is all so confusing."

"Well that doesn't take a lot for you Reno." Came a voice from the door. Reno looked up to see Elena standing there, smiling at him.

"Yeah, hi to you too." He said, sarcastically

"How are you feeling then?" she said

"Better thanks."

"Good. So when you coming back to work?"

"Oh please, we all know already that I'm gonna milk this for all it's worth."

Elena laughed, but soon stopped on seeing the look on Tseng's face.

* * *

Reno stepped out of the door into the harsh wind and rain. He had been allowed to leave the hospital, on condition that he took it easy for a while. Yeah right, he thought to himself. He was still a good shade or two paler than he had been before the whole situation, but they had said it would take a while for him to look right again. He rubbed his eyes and looked around him. Nothing ever really changed around there. He smiled to himself and made his way back to work, unable o think of anything else to do. Maybe he would be able to catch Elena by surprise…

* * *

"So, seriously, when is Reno coming back?" said Rude.

"Not a clue. I really don't think he'll stay in hospital any longer than he has to." Tseng replied absently. As annoying as Reno could be, they all had to admit it was boring without him.

"Well, I'm going to get coffee. Anyone coming?" Elena asked cheerfully

"No thanks." Tseng replied. Rude shook his head.

As Elena walked into the other room, she could have sworn she heard movement behind her, but she ignored it. She thought she heard footsteps, but it turned out to be her own heart beat, which was getting faster as she got more and more nervous.

"Boo." Came a voice from just behind her ear. She screamed and turned around sharply, her reactions causing her to smack the speaker in the face.

"RENO!" she screamed. He burst into fits of laughter despite the dark bruise that was already developing on his the right side of his face.

"What is going on in here?" Tseng said loudly standing at the doorway. He was frowning at Reno, who was clutching his ribs from laughing so much. The amused look on Rude's face, who was standing behind Tseng, only made him laugh harder.

"Reno? Should you be here?" Rude said, carefully keeping the amusement out of his voice.

"I don't know." He said, still laughing. "They let me out."

"Elena, did you hit Reno?" Tseng said eying the bruise on the side of his face.

"Oh my god!" Elena shouted and stormed out of the room.

"Little help, Rude?" Reno said. Rude pulled him to his feet.

"Reno, please don't do that again. The aspirin supply is very low at the moment." Said Tseng, smiling.


	24. Finale

**Authors note:** LAST CHAPTER!! sad isn't it? oh well, be sure to read my new story, the first chapter is up already. Enjoy!!

* * *

Chapter 24 – Finale

"Reno, this your first mission in ages, now don't mess it up." Tseng said seriously.

"Are you sure you should send him on his own?" Rude asked.

"He'll be fine. Right, go now."

Reno stepped out into the cold, his hair blowing slightly in the breeze. All he had to do was get some files from the other side of town, not much of a mission, he thought to himself. He crossed the street quickly, raising his hand to the car that had stopped abruptly to let him cross. Ignoring the stares he was getting from people in the street, especially little kids for some reason, he slipped into the dark alleyway in order to take a shortcut.

The shortcut brought him out in a small neighbourhood. It didn't take him long to spot the building he was supposed to be going to. It was tall, larger by far than all the others. He smiled to himself and made his way towards it.

As he approached the door, he thought he heard someone behind him. He looked around consciously but saw no-one. He ignored it and entered the building.

The inside was very plain. All the walls were decorated brown and white. He spotted a small reception next across the room, with a young blond woman talking on the telephone.

Reno leant on the counter and smiled at the young woman.

"Can I help you, sir?" she asked politely after putting the phone down.

"Sure can. I need to pick up something for Tseng." He said casually.

"Oh right. You must be Reno."

"You bet."

"Just one second, I'll call someone to bring them through." She picked up the phone. "Yes, I need those files for Shinra…Yes he is. Okay." She put the phone down and smiled at Reno. "They'll only be a minute."

"Yeah thanks…" he said absent-mindedly. He was looking back at the glass door that he came in by.

"Listen," he said, "Did anyone leave the building, just before I came in?"

"Well…" she said, still smiling, "We've not been busy. The last person that came in here he was…hmm...quite a bit shorter than you, with black hair." Reno nodded.

"Reno?" a man was standing a little way off him, holding a large, blue file in his hand. He handed it to Reno.

"Cheers." He took it and left quickly.

Reno had hoped he would catch the man, but he was no where to be seen. He glanced at the other two alleyways that led off that part of the neighbourhood, but nothing. He began to make his way back, but he stopped in his tracks when he heard a voice behind him.

"Well, it's nice to see you up and about." Reno turned around to see Zack smirking at him. "I have to say though, you're not exactly looking your best."

"What do you expect?"

"Well, there's no need to loose your temper with me, is there?"

"I'm sure there is." Reno hand moved slowly towards his pocket.

"I've been waiting for this…" Zack pulled a knife out of his pocket. "You killed her, I don't care what Cloud has done, you still deserve to die." He moved towards Reno.

"No, that would be you." Reno quickly pulled his gun out of his pocket and fired it, hitting Zack in the chest. Reno stepped towards him.

"You got no one to help you this time." He smirked

"No…you…"

"Get it in your head. No one gets in the way of Reno and the Turks."


End file.
